


The Fiddle Player's Daughter

by TheMuteOracle



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, Little House on the Prairie - Laura Ingalls Wilder
Genre: Crossover, F/F, Post-Hogwarts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-04
Updated: 2014-10-08
Packaged: 2018-02-19 21:13:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 12,489
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2403083
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheMuteOracle/pseuds/TheMuteOracle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hermione pursues a shady folk-punk band to America and meets Laura Ingalls.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Vana](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vana/gifts), [Hedge_witch](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hedge_witch/gifts).



The music festival felt big and fun and safe. No roads to cross, nobody too strange, nowhere dark.  For little Bibl, the safety brought a wonderful freedom from his older brothers and older sisters and parents who always had an eye on him. He was happy and free.  But he wasn’t dumb. He knew to reappear at regular intervals. It was best to be glimpsed by Holly, the second-oldest sister and center of real authority, just long enough for her to notice him, to wave at him and silently mouth “Hi Bib!” across the crowd, and check him in as safe and accounted for.  And he knew who to avoid in the big crowd: the drunk people, the teenage boys. It’s not so much mean people you need to worry about here as people who are going to mess things up because they don’t even see you. So Bibl had a lovely cherry-flavored crushed ice in one hand, and he had his eyes wide open, and he was headed towards the booth where they sold the funny hats.  

And that was where everything went terribly wrong.

First came the men pushing the heavy cart, yelling at the crowd to make way; so he backed out of the way.  But then there was also a rush of – what was it? four, six? Six big-looking guys, big rough guys like rugby players. So he backed out of their way, too, further from where he meant to go.  He almost dropped his ice, but he held onto it.  But he had backed into some secluded place off the path, between two booths.  And then he saw the strange musician guy looking straight at him.

The man said, “Hello, little one,” in a way that was _entirely_ I’m-creepy-but-trying-to-seem-friendly.  And Bibl _knew_ it; he knew it immediately.  It wasn’t that the man was dressed in strange old-looking robes, or had a punk haircut, or that he was a foreigner. He spoke kind of like mum’s German friend, with that little hardness.  Then Bibl recognized him, and thought, _uh-oh, the drummer._   He had seen the guy’s band play yesterday, and hadn’t much liked their music.  In fact, Holly hadn’t liked it and George hadn’t liked it and even mum hadn’t – mum who seemed to like most bands. Bibl said to himself: _be polite but get away,_ and to the robed man he said “Sorry,” and tried to turn around to go. 

Only, then he saw the second man.  Another one from the same band.  And this one was holding a stick – or, _really? a magic wand? magic wands are not real_ – and saying something Bibl couldn’t hear.  And then, as if someone had placed big muffs over his ears, he couldn’t hear anything at all, and his legs did not obey him; he did not walk away from the men, but towards them, and into their tent, and they zipped it, and they left him there in the stuffy hot afternoon air of the closed tent, paralyzed.

 

** *** **

Hermione Granger Apparated outside the Weasleys’ back garden, feeling agitated, disgusted, and unsociable.  She found Arthur and Ginny Weasley sitting out at the garden table, smiling.  They looked a bit too jolly for her own mood, but at least the unexpected sight of Ginny at home gave her something to smile at, and she said, “Hi Miss Seeker, what are you doing here?”

“I got away from training camp for a day just to come home and plan for Harry’s birthday.  Then I’m going back to Holyhead for a few more days on the brooms, and I’ll come home again on the morning of the party.”

“She makes playing Quidditch sound like a terrible job, doesn’t she?” asked Arthur.

“Believe it!” said Ginny.  “But we really do spend a lot of time in the air.  It’s given me a new appreciation for solid ground.  And for having my feet on it.”

Hermione turned to Arthur. Arthur Weasley was her best ally in the formal halls of the Ministry of Magic. Over the last year, she had come to understand the duplicity of bureaucracy; to see how, while everything was justified in veils of proper procedure, whatever you really accomplished, you accomplished through inside connections and friends and informal channels.  Soon enough – really only six weeks from now – Hermione would put away her ministry robes and go study law. Officially she was merely an intern, and Arthur worked in a different department altogether, and even after the defeat of Voldemort he still followed his script as the amusing Muggle-obsessed bungler.  But informally, Hermione was self-directed, and Arthur was the one who told her the limits she had to work within.  And when she saw something she needed to do, Arthur was the one who turned the doorknobs and borrowed the keys and enabled her to do it.

“Arthur,” she said, “what are these people _doing?_ Voldemort is _dead_ , he’s gone, he’s been gone, and they just don’t stop.”

“Are these your Scandinavian would-be Death Eaters again?” he asked.

“Yes,” she said, “them. The Skagen club. And now I think they’ve gone under disguise as a bunch of Muggle musicians. And they went to a music festival in Wales.  And what I really think is – well, I think they abducted a little Muggle child. I’m _sure_ they did it.”

Ginny said, “Oh, Hermione, everyone wonders.  I mean we even heard it in Holyhead.  The boy’s sister told the Muggle police she saw a man in robes holding a wand.”

Arthur added, “Yes, yes, the Ministry heard that, too – but aren’t planning to do anything about it unless they can verify that there was an actual wizard or an actual wand present.  The Muggles at that festival are weird enough to, you know, play around like that and not seem too far out of place. Anyway, why would the Scandinavians had anything to do with it?”

“Here’s what I know.  I mean, I think I’ve verified it. Arthur, I have a source you know about, and then I have another source. First, the Skagen club wanted to be at the Battle of Hogwarts.  They intended to show up here and fight for Voldemort, but something delayed them, and I don’t know what it was. Now, the Auror’s office claims they are safely tucked in Copenhagen not bothering anyone.  But my source – the one you _don’t_ know – says they’ve disguised themselves as a Muggle band called Ohmnie.  And Ohmnie played at that festival.”

Ginny asked, “What do our own Aurors think?”

“Harry and Ron have been all caught up in that Italian business.  I mean, that situation is bad, too.  It’s probably worse than this one.  This one is a bunch of weirdos who _wanted_ to be Death-Eaters and failed and only managed to kidnap a poor little boy.  And my source told me their next gig is in America, this weekend, at a festival in Oregon. So either they have deposited the boy somewhere, or they’re taking him with them.”

Ginny said “His name is Bibl.  Kind of a funny name, isn’t it? He comes from a family almost as big as ours — only with more girls in it.”

Hermione continued, “I’d really like to see for myself.  I mean, if they have Bibl, I can get him back to his family. If they don’t, I can observe them a bit, and try to understand them better.  I’m not really even sure how I would get there, but I think we should have ... eyes on the ground, if you know what I mean.”

Arthur sat for a long while, sipping his drink. Hermione was strong-willed, but she wasn’t apt to rush into trouble.  To stand in her way, if she was determined, was hardly ever a good idea.  “You think you’re safe going alone?” he asked. 

She nodded.

Finally he said, “Well, you can’t get there directly, but if the Americans let you in, and feel cooperative, they might help.  Hermione, above all, don’t get hurt. Have you ever ridden the Knight Bus? There’s an enchanted ferry that will take you from Portsmouth to New York.  It’s a bit like the Knight Bus, though not _quite_ as adventurous.  Anyway, in the morning, you can wash your Ministry robes and look as proper and official as you can.  I’ll go into the office, and then I’ll come home for lunch with some papers that should help you get through the customs office and get to Oregon.” 

 She said, “Thank you, Arthur.  Tell Ron ...”  _Tell Ron what?_ It was quite easier to think of a list of things _not_ to tell Ron.  But when the family of your nominal boyfriend means this much to you, you don’t always want to let on to them about all the doubts you have.  Or, in late July, that you haven’t had much to say to him since the first of June. “Tell Ron I’ll be back in time for Harry’s party, and I’ll see him there.” 

 

The next day Hermione packed and dressed.  Arthur came home at noon with a scroll for her, and she used the Floo Network to get to Portsmouth, where she purchased a boat ticket.  Then at the Travelling Wizards Express office, she bought specially charmed galleons and sickles that could transform themselves into eight different varieties of Muggle currency on demand. She found herself a good seat on the boat and opened up the book she had been reading: _Witches of the French Revolution_ by Lola Riding Roughshod. The ferry was pleasant and not crowded, it was a beautiful summer day, and Hermione’s first trip to America got off to a fine start.  Once they lost sight of land, they sailed faster and faster, until  they were skimming above the water and all you could see outside was a blur of foam and spray.  They made it to New York in about six hours. 

At the customs house there, one wizard directed her to a special diplomatic desk, where another one then inspected the scroll Arthur had given her, asked where she was going, and consulted a large map of the American Floo Network.  He informed her that her destination would be the fireplace of the Scottish Rite Temple in Bradley Valley Village, Oregon.  Then he stamped her scroll and reminded her that her visa was only valid for three weeks.

As she made her way down the long hallway to the fireplaces, though, he came running to catch up with her again.  “Miss Granger!” he called out.  “Miss Granger, I’m terribly sorry. I have learned that Bradley Village is not accessible to the network at this time, ma’am. Please pardon me. You will need to go to Portland instead. I’m terribly sorry for the inconvenience!”

So she stepped into the flames at the New York Customs House, and stepped out again at a place called the Olympic Stout in Portland, Oregon.  It was a pub, not wholly unlike the Leaky Cauldron, though with a rather sparse menu. She ordered a salad and mentioned to the bartender she was hoping to get to a festival.

“Oh,” he told her, “I’m sure we’ll find someone willing to give you a ride down there!  Everyone’s always happy to do a favor for wizarding folk around here. You might want some Muggle clothes, though.  Not that you’d look to out of place as you are, but it never hurts to be safe, does it?” She ate her salad, changed her clothes in the back room, and saw a few patrons come and go.  Before long a man in his thirties with close-cropped hair sat near her ordering toast and beer, and the bartender told him, “Rob, this young lady has just come here all the way from England and is looking for a ride down to that festival near Eugene.” She hadn’t been expecting to fly on the back of anyone’s broom, but that was how she made the last leg of the journey.   

They touched down in a clearing behind a dairy barn.  “We can’t get too close,” he told her, “there will be a lot of people up there.  It’s Thursday, so folks will be setting up tents and getting ready.  There might even be some music playing, but the festival doesn’t officially open until tomorrow.  Anyway, I’d best drop you here.  We’re at a farm just up the road from the main entrance.  You can walk up this driveway until you hit the main road, then turn right, and in a few minutes you’ll see a parking lot and a big registration tent.”

She thanked him, and he flew off.  Around the corner at the big tent, she found a line of people queueing to enter an arched gateway into the fair site.  A woman stood at the gate asking “Wristbands? Wristbands?” and inspecting the left hand of everyone walking in.  Hermione mingled about enough to get a good view of a wristband: metallic yellow in color, and decorated with white circles – some hollow, some solid. She could not spot anyone selling them. Maybe you needed to have ordered one in advance? Hermione dashed back across the street and behind a hedge, where she pulled her wand from her beaded purse, picked up a leaf from the ground, and transformed it into a wristband. Then she went through the gate into the fair and found a place in a camping area to set up her tent. With a few quick charms, she secured the tent, and wandered out to get the lay of the land.  Not far away she could hear an old-time string band making some excellent music. 

 

** *** **

Laura Ingalls sat on a bale of hay, barefoot, wearing a blue sundress she had sewn herself from fabric she thought matched her eyes, listening to a band she had heard a hundred times.  Thursday night was one of her favorite times at the fair: a good night to walk around and visit, or take a hot shower over at the saunas, or just sit on a bale of hay and stick your toes in the straw. She had been coming here since she was big enough to walk, so this fair was something like her 25th, and all its rhythms were old and familiar. On Thursday night the booths were set up, and there was a little bit of good music and good food, without the heat and dust and crowds that would set in as soon as the gates opened to the public on Friday morning.  The evening was cool. She could breathe in the deep lush smell of woods, and then, as the faint breeze came and went, the natural smells of the place slowly lost ground to the smells of the people, the things they smoked, the food they bought and sold. 

The music made people happy, and a few of the happy people danced. _Dancing_ meant nothing more formal than standing near the stage, perhaps spinning or stomping or whatever else felt good. There were some dancers she knew by sight, many more in the crowd she only half-recognized, and a few strangers who were pleasant enough people to look at: a fellow with a nicely sculpted chest; some girls twirling in fun twirly skirts.

And then up walked a girl looking as lost as a piglet in a pine tree. Well, hardly a girl — Laura’s own age. And Laura’s own height, for that matter.  To the inch.  Wearing blue jeans, socks, sneakers, and a shirt that even Laura knew had gone out of style a decade ago. And a mess of bushy hair, and a palpable kind of weary fatigue in her limbs. But so enthralled by the music, you’d think she had never seen a banjo before. The net effect of it all was adorable, really. There was a bit of sparkle in her eyes, and she was definitely brainy: you could see the gears in motion. Watching, listening, starting to move to the music a bit, stopping herself. Carefully pondering whether or not to dance. Sometimes scanning the crowd as if to search for someone, then closing her eyes and enjoying the night air, then catching herself and trying to be serious again.  Finally the girl gave in and walked up closer to the stage and started dancing. Just a little bit.  Awkwardly. 

Laura thought, _Should I? Well. Why not. It’s the fair, after all._ She sprung up off her hay bale and danced a bit, herself.  She had the advantage of knowing just when the tune would end, so she ended up right beside this particular stranger at the right moment.  People applauded, and they both joined in – even the way she clapped was a bit awkward.  Then Roy the banjo player stepped up to the microphone and said “That’s Charles Ingalls on the fiddle, everyone! Let’s all give him a big hand!” and the new girl clapped even harder.

Laura said to her, “Isn’t he good?  That’s my pa!” 

And she replied, “Yes, he’s fantastic!”  She had a British accent.

 _Okay then, she’s allowed to look out of place, she’s a foreigner._ Laura asked, “Have you ever been here to the fair before?” 

“Not to this one, no.” she answered.  “Really, I just walked in, and I don’t even know my way around.”

_You don’t say?_

The girl continued, “I’m just out trying to get oriented before I head back to my tent for the night.  I’ve had a pretty long day, really.” 

So Laura said, “Well, just outside this stage area is a booth called Ray’s.  It’s the _best_ place for Friday morning breakfast.  But you have to get here early – a long time before the gates open.  I’m planning to be there at eight, myself.” 

“And what time do the gates open?”

Laura replied, “Ten o’clock.” 

“Well, that’s good to know.  Thank you very much!”  She paused.  She really _was_ tired.  “And have a good night – I’d better wander on.”  Then off she went, as awkward as she had come in.


	2. Chapter 2

Early Friday morning in the tent, it was already baking hot. _Is it something about my tent, or is it really this hot outside?_ Hermione stepped outside: _indeed, it’s the hottest day you can imagine. It doesn’t get this hot back home, ever.  So, I’ve got a wardrobe problem. I will roast in these blue jeans._

Back in the tent, she took the jeans off.  _Cutoffs?  Let’s try cutoffs. I’ll just repair them later if I need to_. She laid them out neatly, then cut and hemmed the legs with a flick of her wand.  She also wanted a better top, but that would have to wait until later.

_Well then. Ray’s is the_ best _place for Friday breakfast, is it? Breakfast sounds like just the thing._

She retraced her steps toward where the band had played.  The breakfast place had already drawn quite a crowd, and she weaved through and queued up behind a dozen people to order food. The line moved forward steadily, though not fast, and she asked for blueberry pancakes with bacon and orange juice.  Eating her breakfast at a little stand-up table, she noticed the fiddle player’s daughter waiting in line for food, the morning sun illuminating her round face. Hermione waved.

She came over as Hermione was finishing up her meal.  “Good pancakes? I’m Laura, by the way.”

“Delicious! I’m Hermione.”

“I’m pleased to meet you.  Did you manage to get oriented last night?”

“I’m afraid I went straight back to my tent and fell asleep. But considering I started off the day in London, I don’t feel too bad about it.”

“Well, this place isn’t too hard to figure out.  The main path goes straight from one end of the fair to the other, and the curvy path crosses over it four times – once at each end and twice in the middle.  We’re up at one end, at the acoustic stage.  Are you working? You’ve got a camping pass, right?”

Hermione worried at this.  Was Laura looking at her wristband? Perhaps its color was a bit off. _If she works here, she could kick me out._ She said, “That’s sort of a long story.”

But Laura continued.  “You see, the biggest thing to know is, the folks who buy tickets and come through the gates during the day pay all the bills, but it’s the ones who work here who have most of the fun. I was practically born here, and I have to go work in my booth this afternoon.  If you got that camping pass without begging anyone to let you clean hornets’ nests out of their booth, you’re a lucky girl.” 

Hermione looked up at Laura, noticing her blue eyes, and then looked away and scanned the crowd.  She had never met Jen Star, member of the Skagen Club and the band Ohmnie, and she had never seen Bibl.  But they were probably standing twenty feet away.  The boy seemed fittingly subdued and matched Bibl’s description. As for the woman with him, her jawline and coloring were exactly like Jen’s sister, Cassy Star, who Hermione had visited on Wednesday afternoon before going to the Weasleys’. She would want to follow them.

Laura ate her breakfast while Hermione weighed the advantages of asking her for help. Laura knew the place perfectly, and Hermione still felt foreign. In the worst case, if she got Laura involved and then things went terribly wrong, the protection of Muggles would require her to modify Laura’s memory: something that was always simple, though never fun.  More than once, she had done it to her own parents. 

She spoke softly.  “Laura, I can tell you what I’m doing here, but I hope you’ll help me with something.  Over there, you see the woman in the black top, with the little boy? I need to follow them and find out what I can about them. The real reason I’m here is to rescue that boy and take him back to his family.” 

Laura spotted them in the crowd, and quietly replied, “Okay. That’s not what I expected.”  Then Jen turned to take Bibl’s hand and proceed down the path, and Laura said, “I guess we’d better get going.”

They walked down the wide, straight path through the middle of the fair.  Away from the breakfast crowd, the path itself was clear of people, though the vendors on either side were busy finishing up their displays.  Clothing, crafts, fairy wings, handcrafted jewelry, lemonade, tacos. When Jen took Bibl straight through the first junction, Laura said, “If we went to the right, we’d get to parking and Vaudeville.  We’re about to see Main Stage on the left.  Let’s hope they stay on the path and don’t wander onto Main Stage Meadow.” 

 Jen kept going forward, past the stage and past the next junction.  Soon Hermione began to understand the scale of the place.  The walk from one end to the other, straight along the main path, took 15 minutes.  At the far end, they turned right on the side path, and Laura said, “They must be going to the saunas.”

Hermione could hardly imagine a worse time for a sauna.  “In this heat?” 

“There are also nice showers.  At night it can get colder, and then the sauna feels good.”

The bath house, as they approached it, was by far the most substantial building Hermione had seen here yet. A large sign read:

SAUNAS – SHOWERS – SOAKING TUBS – LIVE MUSIC

Centered around two huge stone chimneys was a set of interconnected gazebos, enclosed by redwood walls ten feet high, without a roof.  But Jen did not take Bibl into the sauna; she headed off the main path and around the building toward the left.

Laura quietly said, “Damn it!”

Hermione walked faster. It would be easy to lose them here.  Behind the building they entered deep shade and took a barely-worn path through the trees.  They lost sight of Jen as the path curved, but sped up and caught sight again.  Laura did not seem happy with this, but she was lagging behind now, and Hermione kept her eyes forward. After more curves, the path went directly between two trees that were only inches apart.  Could a person actually walk there? Jen lifted Bibl up as if to carry him through, and she did: straight through, and out of sight. 

Laura cried, “Don’t! You can’t go there!” But Hermione kept following, straight at the trees, into a gap she knew she couldn’t pass through.

It was not exactly like Platform 9 3/4, because you didn’t have to run at it.  And it was not like getting to Diagon Alley, where there was a certain trick. But it was somewhat like both of those, in that it was a gateway that not everyone could traverse, and you had to aim confidently for a precise spot.  Hermione could do it. Jen could do it, and could take Bibl through, much as Muggle-born Hogwarts students could take their parents to Diagon Alley for shopping. 

On the other side, the woods felt tangibly different.  Ahead, the path rose gradually, and straightened; the trees thinned.  She could see Jen clearly again, and would not need to run anymore.  She took a few steps down the path. Would her friend appear behind her?  No, if Muggles can’t get through that gap, Laura would still be looking for her on the other side.  

But Laura did step through, and when she did, she was angry to the verge of tears. “You’re not supposed to do that! You can’t! _How_ did you do that!?” 

Hermione couldn’t make much sense of this. “Well ... I’ve done things kind of like that before, but I was afraid _you_ wouldn’t be able to get here.”

“ _I live here!”_ Laura said,almost loud enough for Jen to hear her up the road, but realized this and then lowered her voice.  “Okay, we can keep going.  They’re probably headed into town.”  A minute later, still tense, she added, “But we should keep them in sight going past the farm path, just to be sure.”

The path uphill was long enough for Hermione to start feeling winded.  From the top, the complete strangeness of the landscape struck her.  To the right, trees of a magnitude she had never imagined, simply taller and broader than she had ever seen; to the left, small storybook farms that seemed neither Muggle nor Wizard.   Ahead, Jen and Bibl had passed a junction where the path widened into more of a road.  Hermione asked Laura, “Is that the farm path?” 

Laura nodded, and closed her eyes for a moment, visibly struggling with her emotions.  Then she quietly said, “We won’t lose them now, but if you don’t want them to see us, we should hang back.”  

The road beyond the farm path widened into a rutted cart track.  Then they descended, passing a fenced pasture with a few cows grazing, then a plain farm house with a well pump and chickens in the yard, then a neat yellow house with a large red barn.  Beside the barn stood a plough of the sort that could be harnessed to horses, perfectly maintained, as if still in regular use.  

Ahead of them, they saw Jen and Bibl turning off the road towards a two-story house made of stone and wood.  Laura, on a sharp exhale, whispered, “You are kidding me,” and stopped and sat down in the middle of the road. 

Hermione stood long enough to see them walk into the house. She stood a minute longer, taking in the scenery.  Then she sat down with Laura.

Laura explained, “That’s Old Pat’s old house. She was the mayor’s aunt, and now he keeps the house up.  So your friends down there are visiting the mayor of Bradley Valley.” 

Hermione pondered that. “They’re also in a band called Ohmnie.”

“Oh, they’re playing on main stage, aren’t they? But most entertainers camp out behind the stage there.”

“Do you think they’re staying in the house, or just meeting the mayor there?”

Laura thought. “If he was just meeting them, he would probably meet them in town.  Or at the fair.  So I’d say they’re staying.” 

“Laura, I’m sorry if all this upset you. I feel bad about bringing you into it, and without you I’d be sitting up here with no clue where I was. So I really have to thank you. I guess you didn’t expect me to get through those two trees.”

“No.”  She glanced up at Hermione, then down again.  “That portal is supposed to magically protect the valley from outsiders. Maybe it’s broken.”

Hermione sat and considered all of this. “So now I know where Jen and Bibl are staying, and there’s probably not much more to learn about them at the moment.  We could go back to the fair if you’d like.”

Laura nodded.  “I have to work, and I’d like a shower first. What we don’t get much of here in this beautiful valley is nice hot water.” 

Hermione stood up, then offered Laura a hand to pull herself up on, and they turned back up the road towards the woods.  Along the way Hermione said, “I don’t think most people could have gotten through that portal.  That other woman, Jen – she went to a special kind of school in Germany, and I went to one in Britain, and so we both already knew how to approach it when we saw it there. I expect someone had to teach you about it when you first went through, didn’t they?”

“That’s right,” she said. “Pa showed me.  And someone could have shown Jen.”

“And, really, Jen showed me – though I knew what to look for.”

“And I can show you how to go the other direction.  Getting out of here isn’t much easier than getting in.”  

They crested the hill again, and started downward, the path getting smaller and shadier.  Indeed, Hermione saw that if Laura hadn’t known just where to go, they could have ended up wandering in circles it the wooded ravine.  She followed Laura through the portal, and along the path back to the bath house.  

Laura said, “If you’re interested in a shower, you could come in with me.  It’s a really nice place.”

“Sure.”

 

** *** **

A conquered Celt steps into the _caldarium_ of the Roman bath for the first time, and says, in some ways these Romans are brilliant.  A weary Finnish man relaxes into the bench of his sauna, and gains the courage to face another January.  The greatest wizarding mind of her generation takes in the sights of the fair’s bath house: cedar flooring, limestone mosaics, and naked Oregon hippies in the leafy sunlight and open air. And she thinks, _This will be fine.  I’ll take off my clothes?  I’ll take off my clothes._

Men and women, unsegregated.  The dusty, the clean, and the currently washing.  Barely fourteen years old or nearly seventy.  Scarred from surgery, tattooed, or unadorned.  

A sign reads 

NO:

DRUGS 

SMOKE

GLASS CONTAINERS

HARASSMENT

and a muscular, clothed man sitting quietly in a corner appears ready to enforce it. Person after person walks in here thinking himself a prudish Anglo-Protestant, takes a few looks around, and casts all that aside.

Hermione stuffed her clothes into a cubicle on the wall and found a shower. She was dustier and grimier than she had realized.  The perfect warm water felt better than she expected it to. Then she stepped into a dry sauna for a few minutes, and felt the pores of her skin begin to open, the muscles holding her shoulders start to loosen. She sat by a burbling pool with a total stranger on one side of her and a woman she’d first met hardly twelve hours ago on the other.  Warm and relaxed, she returned to the cubicle. The clothes seemed dirty and unworthy, but she slipped on the shorts.  

Laura, not yet dressed, walked up to her.  By coincidence, it was a private moment: the angle of the walls, the fact that it was still early and uncrowded, the fact that nobody else was dressing in that particular area right then, left them momentarily unseen and unnoticed.  Laura leaned in and kissed Hermione on the cheek.  “I’m sorry I got so upset out there,” she said softly. 

This carried a tinge of nervous regret, and Hermione reflexively softened and reached up towards Laura, fingertips just meeting skin.

Laura smiled, the nervousness vanishing. She put a finger to her own lips as if to say _shhh,_ bent down, and kissed Hermione’s stomach.  Then she straightened up and quietly kissed her once more, on the lips. Hermione’s skin was warm all over again.  She would have gladly taken a fourth kiss, but Laura turned away to fetch her own clothes.

Leaving the bath house back toward the main paths, they saw the gates had opened and the fair was bustling.  Everywhere you could look were clowns, stilt walkers, fairgoers in masks, children in fairy wings.  At one point traffic on the path stopped moving altogether. Hermione heard a marching band approach them – a very strange looking marching band, with no two players dressed alike, and a few hardly dressed at all – and then realized it was blocking the whole road.  Whenever the path seemed particularly impassable, Laura would lead her around a booth or a corner so they could continue onward. 

Eventually Laura said, “My booth is over that way.  It’s called Rose City Coffee.  I’m on the afternoon shift, so I’ll be there until around five.”

Hermione nervously bit her lip, and said, “I’ll look for you there some time later.” She was feeling almost giddy.  She took Laura’s hand and gave it a small parting squeeze, and then Laura weaved away through the crowd. 

Hermione wanted clothes – something that would fit in better with the crowd and feel comfortable in the heat.  She set out alone, exploring several booths without much luck, then realized she had come to the vaudeville stage.  The theater area was comfortably shaded and had plenty of hay-bale seating, so she ducked in and sat down to watch.

The stage set suggested a tall-masted ship docked in a harbor, and the ship’s captain was walking off, down the plank, to meet a king seated on a throne. He stood before the king in trepidation, not knowing how he’d be received.  The king stood, raised his sword, and tapped the captain on the shoulders to make him a knight. Only, immediately afterward, he announced he would have to punish him as well, and lifted the sword menacingly. The audience laughed. What would he do, cut off the man’s head? They never found out, because just then, clowns and jugglers rushed onstage from one side and swept the actors away, leaving just two jesters in motley. 

Then one jester took the throne like the king, the other descended the plank like the captain, and they replayed the whole scene again in mime – only to be swept off by the clowns again, crossing the stage from the other side. This time the original king descended into one side of the audience, and the captain to the other side, and each stole a girl from her seat and took her back to the stage.  With one girl positioned on the ship and the other on the throne, they coaxed them to play the scene over for a third time.  When the girl-king raised the sword to make the final threat, she was interrupted by the two jesters leaping into each others’ arms like long lost lovers. It was just a pair of characters in a story told and retold; a single scrap of narrative, reused and reiterated, recycled and transformed; dramatic, then ridiculous, then absurd. 

 


	3. Chapter 3

Vophyd Roeten milled about the guest house, expecting a visitor.  In the living room, Jen and Marv were working on a new song – a pretty good one, Vophyd thought. Bibl was in there with them, staring out the window. The boy had spent the day alternately engaged and withdrawn; he might connect with one of the band members for a few minutes, or he would find something to play with for a while, but then he would disappear into his own thoughts.

The guitar stopped, and just then Bibl looked up and said, “There’s a man coming to the house.” 

Vophyd went to the window and recognized the tall frame and shaved head of his guest, his American friend, Newman, who must have Apparated just outside the gate. They had last met in Iceland. The Icelandic wizarding community was quite small and, with regard to politics, had held consistently neutral. In the years since Voldemort’s defeat, it had proven a good place for get-togethers. A small group like The Skagen Club could meet all of their like-minded fellows from around the world outside Reykjavik, and still the total gathering hardly numbered sixty.  Not enough to yet count as a movement.  They would discuss philosophies and strategies, end up in a loud disagreement, and then enjoy the hot springs all together. Last year in Iceland, Vophyd had informed everyone of his plans for Ohmnie, and this had prompted Newman to tell him about this village and this festival.  

Vophyd welcomed him into the house, and Newman embraced him warmly, then looked around and said, “This is a nice place.  I see Mayor Jack is being good to you.”

“Yes, he is indeed.  It’s nice to see you again, my friend.”

“It is, it is.  So, tell me, what is the news from Europe?  Is the Dark Lord still dead, or is he coming back again?”

Marv chimed in from the living room, “Truly dead, and the Death Eaters are racist pricks!”

But Vophyd had a more nuanced opinion.  He said, “Who am I to say he won’t come back?  Has there ever been anyone greater at Dark Magic?  For the time being, it doesn’t matter one bit.  Today we are on a mission.  We go out among the Muggles and we evangelize through music.  But some day, before it’s all over, Dark Magic will be the card that wins it all.”  

Newman noticed Bibl, still sitting by the window, and asked, “Who is your young friend here?”

“Let me tell you about Bibl,” Vophyd said. “He is a very special, magical boy we found last week in Wales. We were on stage, and I was playing bongos, but I kept hitting the wrong part of the drums.  My bongos kept moving around, so I would try to hit the center of the drum, but I’d get the rim instead.  Finally a drum moved so much I missed it altogether and slapped my own leg.  Then I looked around the audience, and saw this little fellow, standing all innocent-looking, with his mum and his sisters, grinning at his own power.  Moving my bongos around just by thinking about them.  Bibl might have had a long, hard life with his Muggle family never understanding who he really was, but we rescued him.  Now we will send him to Durmstrang so he can become a magnificent wizard.”

Newman looked askance at this, but stepped toward the living room and said, “Welcome to the club, Bibl.  I hope everyone’s being nice to you?”

Bibl nodded meekly, “yes, I guess so.” 

Newman returned to Vophyd.  “There’s something I’d better tell you.  Apparently there’s a witch from England down here.  Art says she’s a young little thing, barely out of Hogwarts. Said she showed up at the pub last night in fancy formal robes, and then Rob gave her a ride down here on his new Nimbus.”  He glanced again towards Bibl. “I hope she’s not interested in your bunch.”

“Is she here in the village?”

“No, Rob left her at the fair, but then he tailed her for a bit.  You know, the Muggles here have these wristbands, if they’re camping.  They make them so they are quite difficult to counterfeit. Well, he says she’s pretty skilled, because she charmed up a perfect one.  Anyway, Rob watched her set up her tent, so he knows where to find her.  And then he left.  She may not even know the valley exists.  She never gave him any sign that she did, anyway.”

Vophyd changed the subject.  “This valley is a beautiful place, my friend. It’s like stepping right into the nineteenth century.”

“The Muggles who live here seem to love it,” Newman said.  “And, I think I told you in Iceland, the old hags back east in the Magical Congress are scared to touch it.  The place is Unplottable, and it’s protected with more charms than you can count.  Nobody even knows what they are.  Bradley, the founder, was a tremendous wizard.  If you hike up the east end of the valley, you get to a big, burnt, charred spot along the river where a bridge used to be.  It’s black to this day, and nothing grows there.  That’s the only thing left from the last time the officials tried to mess with this place, a hundred years ago. Anyway, the Muggles are very attached to it, but they’re always scared the magic is about to fail, so the mayor begs Congress for help and Congress ignores him.” 

Vophyd said, “He told us the protective charms have to be renewed, or they stop working.”

“Maybe some of them do.”  Newman paused a moment.  “About the English girl. If she poses any kind of threat to you, my guys will be glad to ... eliminate it.” 

Vophyd wondered if she be here because of the boy.  It had been a mistake to grab him like that. One night they had said, let’s find a really smart magical kid, let’s recruit him to our side, make sure he gets all the way through Durmstrang and comes out as a powerful wizard.  Hell, Vophyd had even added, I’ll give up control.  I’ll let him be our next leader.  And then a few weeks later he fell into their lap. 

But there’s a big difference between recruiting someone and just snatching him, isn’t there?  And here already, here’s your chance to make the next mistake.  How quickly they pile up.

“No,” Vophyd said. “I don’t think she has anything to do with us. I don’t think you should bother her.”

 

** *** **

Laura and Hermione stood at a rickety little table next to  the coffee booth, sharing a pizza and drinking mead.  Hermione was in all new hand-made fair clothes: a colorful top, a little skirt, and sandals. “It looks like you had some fun shopping,” Laura told her.  “The shirt is from Misty’s Cottons?  Over by the electric stage?” 

“Yes, that sounds right,” Hermione answered. 

“And the sandals?” 

“Oh, not far from there.  A little guy tucked in a corner.  He sits there doing leather work.” 

“Oh, him – he can do some pretty fantastic things!” 

Hermione wiped a bit of cheese from her face.  The pizza had a fine, blistered cracker crust.  Standing at the counter waiting for it, she had felt the intense heat off the huge black barrel of the pizza oven, hulking there on the ground, complete with wheels and a trailer arm so that it could be towed from a car.  “I enjoyed wandering, but I’m sure it would have been more fun with you,” she said.  “Here, I also stopped at a booth that sells beadwork.” From a small sack, she carefully emptied two silver chains; two tiny hands, cast from metal, hardly half an inch from the fingertips to the wrist, where a small loop would hold them to the chain; and two miniature styluses, finely worked from obsidian.  “One of these is for you, if you’d like it. But I need to take it back to my tent tonight and do some work on it, first.”

Laura smiled and said, “Yes, that’s lovely, thank you. Don’t spend _too_ much of the evening in your tent, though.  There’s fun to be had out here.  Not for me, though.  I have to be up before dawn to come back and work that huge oven.” 

“The pizza oven?”

“I told you Ray’s has the best breakfast on Friday, right?  Well, the best breakfast on Saturday is right here.  Popovers, strawberry butter, and coffee.  It’s a group effort between us and the pizza guys.  I have to start baking before the sun comes up, but the good news is that then I get the whole rest of the fair free.” 

They finished their mead and wandered down the paths.  At the electric stage they stopped to listen to a guy wearing glasses, playing the organ, and singing something about the rain.  Then, wandering onward, Laura offered, “You could walk me back home, if you’d like. I won’t even get angry, this time.  You could see the village.”

“I’d be noticed, wouldn’t I? I mean, if strangers don’t usually get past that barrier, then you must not see many of them there?” 

“Well, strangers sometimes show up.  And it’s the fair.  And I’m _not_ the shyest girl in town.  So, yes, you’ll be noticed, but it won’t be too shocking.  Those people in Ohmnie are probably causing a bigger stir. Besides, the portal is magical, right? If you weren’t supposed to come in, I don’t think it would have let you.” 

“Oh, I doubt it’s a _conscious_ barrier,” Hermione replied. 

“You seem to know about these things.” 

They made their ways past the bath house, through the gap in the trees, into Bradley Valley.  Again, Hermione was struck by how different everything felt on the other side of the portal.  The air was cooler.  The sounds of the music and crowds were replaced by buzzing insects, twittering squirrels, squawking crows, and then, as they climbed out of the woods towards the farmland, of pigs and cattle.  

Hermione paid special attention to the mayor’s guest house as they walked by it, but saw nothing worth noticing.  Just beyond it, their path joined another, and starting from the junction it was paved with stones and became the main street.  The village came into sight.  They passed more houses, a small church, and a library.  She saw a store marked Hudson Bay Company, and, just past it, the center of town, where the road intersected a side street.  

On their left at the intersection was the First Congregational Church, a grand, wooden building, much larger than the first church they had seen.  Opposite the church stood the most monumental building Hermione had yet seen in Oregon: a two-story, classical stone mansion with Doric columns, its portico engraved SCOTTISH RITE TEMPLE.  And across the main street from the church, on their right, stood a small town hall.  Beside its main door, an emblem displayed three sheaves of wheat, with the words BRADLEY VALLEY, OREGON painted below them, and below that, a salmon.  Below the emblem, a pair of hooks held a a simple hanging sign which read “Chester S. Pevensie III, Mayor”. 

Hermione asked “Chester S. Pevensie the Third – that’s who’s hosting Ohmnie?”

“I’ve never known what the ‘Chester S.’ is about,” Laura laughed. “Everybody calls him Jack.  Now – we can go up here and I’ll show you my school room.”  They turned right, between the town hall and a simple red house, and walked up the side street.  The town’s schoolhouse was a simple U-shaped building where several classrooms all opened towards their central courtyard.  Laura’s room was unlocked.  There was nothing to it but desks and a chalk board.  

Laura sat on the teacher’s desk.  “I went to Portland for a year, you know.  A girl grows up here, and wants to get out.  Wants to belong to the actual world, make real money.  Have an identity.  My friends up at the booth run a coffee shop there. So I went, and it was hard and dirty.  You do make money, but you have to spend it just as fast: rent, groceries, bus fares.  Then last summer I came back here to the fair, and I heard that Mary Bradley Ingalls was going to have a baby, and I could take over the 10- and 11-year-olds’ classroom if I wanted it. I can tell you about Mary Bradley Ingalls: she’s married to my cousin, for one thing, and she’s related by birth to theBradleys who founded this place. Anyway, I came back. I get a house to live in and eighty-five dollars a month.” 

They left the school room. Laura continued, “I should show you the community orchard.  It’s the pride and joy of this place.  But it’ll be dark before we can get up there, so maybe tomorrow.  My house is just back around the corner.”  

They went back towards the town hall and continued along the main street until Laura pointed out her simple wooden cottage.  Once they reached her porch, she picked up a watering can and said, “Let’s go check on the garden.” 

As they walked behind the house, Hermione jumped.  Her beaded purse had kicked into her side like a rabbit and then landed back against her. 

It kicked again.  She grabbed it.  

“Laura!” she exclaimed. “I have to run.  Someone’s messing with my tent.” 

Laura turned around, looking surprised.  Hermione quickly took both of Laura’s hands, said, “Good night,” and kissed her on the lips.  Then, out of her little beaded purse, she pulled a wand that was quite longer than the purse itself.  She held the wand upright, turned on her heels, and Disapparated.

Laura Ingalls stood there for a solid minute, watering can in hand, mouth wide open. 

 

Hermione, meanwhile, Apparated inside her tent, which, like her purse, was quite larger inside than out.  The intruder had gotten past the first-level charm – a bee enchanted to sting anyone reaching to open the outer rain fly – and triggered the second.  Hermione said _Lumos,_ and aimed her illuminated wand out her door. Then she silently cast a spell to turn the tent fabric transparent from the inside, though remaining opaque from without, and giving her a clear view into the world. 

She could see two men quickly walking away. They had already made a good distance. One of them might have been Rob, from the pub. She had certainly seen enough of his back during the broom ride, but she couldn’t tell for sure, and she had already performed magic in front of Muggles once tonight.  Doing it again – and down here at the fair – might make things even worse.  So she carefully inspected the ground just outside her tent. Once she was convinced the visitors had not disturbed anything, she restored the tent to normal, dimmed the wand, and sat down on a cushion.  

_Let’s assess the situation_ , she thought. 

_Point #1_ : Someone from the Magical Congress of the United States could show up any minute now. Or send an owl. Back home, the Ministry would certainly respond quickly to something like this.  I could even get deported before I have a chance to collect Bibl. I Disapparated right in front of Laura, so I may have to change her memory.  However, I’m not going to do that of my own volition – not unless someone makes it clear to me that it’s required. Laura lives in a magical place; she walks through magical barriers on a regular basis; she’s not an ordinary Muggle.

_Point #2_ : How is it that I have gone from feeling wholly unsexual for so long to suddenly bisexual?  Transcendently, exuberantly bisexual? _Transcendently, exuberantly,_ and ... are there other good adverbs?  Is that a tangent?  Point #2 is deferred for later consideration.

_Point #3_ : By what stretch of the law to I have any jurisdiction to do anything to Ohmnie?  (For use in considering point #3, she reached into her bag, tossed aside _Witches of the French Revolution,_ and pulled out _Wizarding Law Since Roman Times._ )  Can I come to American soil and arrest a citizen of a third country without involving the local authorities?  Absolutely not.

_Point #4_ : _Transcendently, exuberantly, ecstatically, exhilaratingly_... no, that’s not point #4.

_Point #5_ : Can I Apparate all the way home?  With Bibl side-along, and be confident not to splinch him?  No. Take the ferry. But don’t risk going back to Portland.  If the Floo Network actually connects to the Scottish Rite Temple, use that to get to New York. Otherwise we’ll have to Apparate to New York. 

_Point #6:_ About Laura: They could have already wiped her memory. It might be a routine thing around here. Maybe some wizard had walked over from the Scottish Rite Temple or town hall and taken care of it as soon as Hermione was gone.  After all, were there wizards in Bradley Valley, or weren’t there? 

She closed her eyes. After a few minutes, she pulled out the little sack she had bought from the bead vendor emptied it out, and carefully arranged each item in front of her.  Then she raised her wand.  She would have preferred to have a few more reference books with her, and a stock of magical substances. But working with what she had, she started enchanting, experimenting with the little items one by one, slyly convincing each piece of its intangible connections to the others. She began establishing relationships among little pieces of metal and stone; relationships that would carry on tomorrow, and the day after, and when the beads were separated by continents and oceans. She kept on at this for more than two hours, until finally, she was quite happy with it. Perhaps it was even some of her best work. Then she felt quite exhausted, and went to bed. 

 


	4. Chapter 4

Saturday morning.  The popovers with strawberry butter were, indeed, delicious: steamy puffs of bread, cut open and covered in sweetness.  If Harry were here, Hermione considered, he might savor one appreciatively. Ron, however, would simply stuff his face with one after another. Whether this means they are actually wasted on Ron is a question one might ask, if one had the patience for it. Albus Dumbledore would have praised these popovers, with that twinkle in his eye; Severus Snape, quietly, with no twinkle. 

Laura and Hermione began talking as soon as they spotted each other, and Laura made it quite clear that her memory had not been compromised in the least. “Was everything in your tent okay?” she asked.

“There was someone messing around outside, but they didn’t bother anything.”

“And is that something you learned at your special school? Vanishing like that?”

“One of the things, yes. I also learned that I wasn’t supposed to let you see me do it.”

“Well, don’t think I’ve never seen a wand before.  We might not have any magic left here, but we do have a few wands.”

From her purse, Hermione pulled the two necklaces, now assembled with a hand and a stylus strung along each chain.  She placed one of them around Laura’s neck and clasped it — “This one is yours” — and put the other one on herself.  “They’re specially charmed, but I’ll have to show you that later.”

As the morning continued, the flow of words came easier and easier. Laura, especially, was unreserved, and Hermione found this foreign and yet also comforting. You didn’t have to wonder where you stand with someone who was always so quick and direct about letting you know. Their conversation swelled and consumed the day.  Here they stood to watch a band play, there they danced again, there they drank lemonade; but all these events were mere rocks in the river of their conversation.

“Two boys,” Hermione explained, sitting on the main stage meadow and waiting to hear Ohmnie.  “Harry and Ron.  I met them on the first day of school when I was eleven years old, and we were inseparable from then on.  And we went through so much – more than I can really tell you, even.  A lot more than just the usual school stuff.”

“Was it ever romantic?” 

“Never with Harry. Ron ... kind of always.” 

“And how did that go, with Ron?”

“Well, I can’t stand him at the moment, and I haven’t spoken to him in a month, and I really wish he’d grow up. But I’m not sure it’s entirely over yet.”

Ohmnie took the stage.  Vophyd stood in back with drums of all sorts: congas, steel oil drums, a huge bass drum, an African djembe, a set of common tom toms.  Upstage were Jen with her guitar and Marv wearing bagpipes.  To the side stood Sharpf with a huge didgeridoo.  The Master of Ceremonies introduced them, and they launched into a lilting song that seemed to be about quitting school and living in the forest.  

Hermione wondered aloud, “Where is Bibl?” 

They scanned the crowd, then Laura pointed him out – standing near the side of the stage next to a very tall man they had never seen.  

After the first song, Jen took the microphone and said, “Here is a song for our sick world.  The oceans are dying.  The forests are dying.  And this song is about the people at the very top, the few people with all the power.  The people who could fix everything, but just stand around with their heads up their arses instead!”  Then Vophyd began a deep pulsing beat on the drums, the didgeridoo swelled up in the lowest bass register, and the bagpipe came in, its drone an octave above the didgeridoo, the two of them melding into a single huge sound with textures and inner pulsations of its own.  Then Jen strummed her acoustic guitar at its loudest, a gesture more punk than folk, and everyone near the stage began to dance.

Laura and Hermione sat through a few more songs, then walked to the acoustic stage and rested on the hay bale where Laura had been Thursday night.  Quietly, Laura talked about her home town, with its good school and bustling library and three churches.  “Nearly everyone in the valley has a good life, I think, especially if you compare us to the backwoods people around here.  Those folks might actually have a lot more money than we do, but they are miserable and ignorant and dirt poor.  When we worry about the valley getting discovered, that’s what we’re scared we will all become. And yet, there are big reasons someone would leave. Suppose someone out here in the state of Oregon gets appendicitis; they go to the hospital, and then come out three days later like nothing ever happened. If you get appendicitis in the valley, it kills you.”

Late that afternoon they decided that Hermione should pack up her tent and go to Laura’s house, a better place for keeping an eye on Ohmnie.  Once more they walked beyond the bath house and through the narrow gap in the trees.  Once they had both stepped through, Hermione cleared away some leaves to make a place to sit down.  “Here,” she said, “I want to show you about the pendants.”

Hermione removed her necklace, and pulled a note pad from her purse. The she gently placed the tiny stylus into the tiny hand, where it fit perfectly like a pencil.  Holding the little hand and stylus closely between her own thumb and finger, she used the stylus to write the words _Hi Laura – Love, Hermione._ Then she returned the pendant to her neck and said, “Here’s the good part.” 

Laura startled. “Oh my! It’s tapping me!” The hand of her pendant had gently tapped her in on the collar bone. 

“When it taps you, it has a message, so you’d better take it off and give it the pencil.  Here’s some paper.”

Laura lifted her necklace over her head and placed the stylus into the hand as Hermione had.  As soon as it had its stylus, the hand wrote out _Hi Laura – Love, Hermione_ on Laura’s paper, exactly as it was on Hermione’s.  

Laura said, “It’s a sort of little telegraph!”

“Just for us.  You can use it if you ever need help.  Or if you just want me to come visit again.”

Laura was awe-struck, yet again. She managed to say “Wow,” and then “Thank you.”  Then she looked straight at Hermione with clear blue eyes and said, “Listen. This place, right here, I think everyone worries about it.  My pa, the mayor, that bunch – I don’t think any of them really understand how the magical protections work.  They pray for someone like you to show up and explain it all.  But nobody ever has.  Until, maybe, you.”

Hermione was surprised.  “Laura,” she managed to say, “of course I want to help.  I would have to figure it out, as much as I could, and I would have to be very careful.  But I’ll help.” 

** *** **

Imagine Laura Ingalls. Understand that _Little House_ is not a memoir. Nellie Olsen is fiction, Jack the bulldog is fiction, and in the end, Laura herself is fiction.  There is Laura, a writer, and Laura, a character, constructed of words, and then, for each individual reader, her own Laura.  From the depths of 1970s television comes yet another, rather questionable one.  And here is another Laura Ingalls altogether, Laura Ingalls wearing only a soft lace shirt, Laura Ingalls unexpectedly in love with someone she met just a few days ago. Laura Ingalls born and raised within a magical gap on the map of Oregon.  Laura who never sewed shirts in De Smet, but who did spend a year pulling espresso shots in Portland. Laura who has never read _Harry Potter._

Her bedroom walls are the color of coffee mixed with milk, though the paint is uneven and cloudy in places, and the dappled light through the venetian blinds can confuse the eye, making it hard to tell paint blotches from shadows.  Two small landscape paintings hang on opposite walls, above a double bed on a simple iron frame.  Its headboard features a broad lattice pattern where the iron bars cross at an angle to the frame itself.  

Imagine Hermione Granger. Naked. Confident, but her heart pounding nonetheless.  Hermione who was fortunate enough, in school, never to have much time to worry about her body. Hermione who was immersed in every textbook; shut in the library every evening; determined on every exam; and, oh, when all that wasn’t enough, facing life-or-death peril. Currently a little sweaty. A little colder than she would like. Not entirely smelling as she’d want to; that shower was a few days ago.  But feeling really good about the person in front of her.  After twenty-two years of being a person, and ten or so of being a sexual person, and even three of living on her own in London, she has never had a wholly positive sexual moment until now.  Now when Laura Ingalls, with her blue eyes, in her soft shirt, touches her with her hands, and her lips, and her tongue.  More with the hands.  The lips here.  A hard scratch of nails here, a fingertip caress there. Hermione closes her eyes.  She lies back on the bed, lets her hands drop to her side, spreads one knee a little more towards the edge of the bed.  She doesn’t want Laura to stop what she’s doing.  Laura doesn’t.  

 

** *** **

“Hermione!”

Hermione opened her eyes.  It was morning, and Laura was dressed. 

“Jen and Bibl and the drummer are walking down Main Street!”

Hermione threw on her clothes and grabbed her bag. They walked out onto Laura’s front porch just in time to see the three people head into the front door of the Scottish Rite.

Hermione said “Let’s go!” and they both ran down the stairs.

 

** *** **

Jack Pevensie sat in his office with Vophyd, and Jen, and the small boy.  

Vophyd said, “You say you need the people in the magical world, but they do nothing for you.  If you ask me, they do nothing for anybody.  The only thing they care about is staying hidden. I am tired of them.  You have a beautiful valley, and I feel like I am your brother here, and I want to help you out here, however I can, if you can help me too.”

Pevensie thought, _I couldn’t feel less like your brother, but what choice do I have?_ He asked himself, has it really come down to dealing with people like this?  If I have gotten this desperate, have I failed already?  

Four times a year, the older men of the lodge visit the secret portals of the valley.  Once in summer sun, twice in the usual drizzle, and once, likely enough, in a flooding December downpour.  They put on the official vestments, trudge out to the corners of their little world, wave the wand, and say the words they learned years ago.  But in the last few years, certainly since Sandy died, he knows it’s all been just so much hocus-pocus.  When his cousin Sandy, the late Alexander Pevensie, waved the wand, the wand responded.  Jack had seen it; he had seen the wand react in Sandy’s hand.  And he had felt the security, in those days.  No leaves came through the magical barriers; no surprised squirrels; no stray hikers.  The men would go back to the lodge, drink coffee.  Spend the rest of the year having all the usual parties and the meetings. You had to do a good job throwing parties, had to keep it interesting for the younger men, mix in the usual fraternal whatnot, get the young men into the lodge and moving up the ranks. And you could do this knowing that the valley was still hidden and secure.  Secure because you went out four times a year and wore the vestments and waved the wand and said the words, the way the brothers before you had taught you to do, as it had been done since Percival Bradley had first established the place, before the Civil War.  Percival’s family had surely been magical – and they were not the only magical family, even – but the magic had slowly died out, and whatever was left, whatever Sandy had been the last person to cling to, had died with him. 

Five years ago, the man from the Magical Congress of the United States had shown up in the lodge hall with nothing but questions, offering no help and no answers. Jack responded to all the questions as best he could and in good faith, hoping some good might come of it, but none ever did.

The next summer brought a different man altogether: serious, strange, apocalyptic.  He said: Lord Voldemort is rising; you will need to choose sides here. We will be back for you when Lord Voldemort has conquered all.  And then, again, nothing.  Four years of feeling weaker and weaker, more and more vulnerable, and not a word from the mysterious higher-ups.  Who was Lord Voldemort? Had he taken over? Did it matter? Or was that man really just as crazy as he looked? Or had Jack eaten a bad batch of apples and hallucinated the whole thing? 

Jack Pevensie held his valley and its way of life dear to him, above all things.  Nowadays, a kid on a hike could accidentally stumble down their path.  Luckily the geographers and lumber companies and road-builders and other officials of the State of Oregon had been kept away so far: any one of them could spell disaster.  But there was that hippie boy from Corvallis, who had been happy to bring them sugar and coffee if they started to run out, happy that he kept their secrets and they kept his. How did he find them? What if something changed and he returned, somehow more difficult than before?

And now these people, who struck him as mean and uneducated. Yet they held all the cards.  Jack Pevensie felt blessed to have an idyllic life in a beautiful valley; doubly blessed to have this life rather than the life in the outside world, with its electricity and televisions and logging trucks and its fear of nuclear war or terrorists or whatever it is people were afraid of these days. But if you were his most intimate associate, if you were the next-most-senior lodge member, about to take on all this burden yourself, Jack would tell you that the one great frustration, the one bitter pill of it all, was this succession of haughty, bizarre, motley people who appeared, from out of the fireplace in the lodge or wherever they came from.  Who appeared out of nowhere and left just as quickly and never helped with anything. Ten years of petty magical bureaucrats, and then some messianic ranter, and now this bunch.

Outwardly, he smiled politely.  

“Vophyd, we are quite grateful for your offer to refresh the enchantments that protect us here. We feel we know the spells, but whatever magic was here is dying out, and a youthful infusion will do us some good.  And I’m happy to host you and your companions here whenever you might show up.  You will find that we’re a tight-knit community, and we have particular ways of doing things here, and I trust that you can adapt to them.  I’m flattered to finally have visitors from the magical world. My last one was years ago, a man who babbled on about a Lord Something-or-other coming to power and then left, and never came back to enlighten us as to what had happened.”

Vophyd spent a few seconds processing this statement while Jack let his gaze shift to Jen, and then the boy.  He wondered why they would bring such a young fellow along.  To impress him? To show him what grownup scoundrels do all day? At last Vophyd said, “The Dark Lord has not come to power.  Not yet, at least. But if his day should come, I am his man. Could he be any worse...”

And then, quite unexpected, he heard a woman’s voice in the hallway just outside say, “We’re going in.”  And who walked in but Laura Ingalls, again, this time with her friend, the one he had seen her with on Friday. _Please, there should not be this many women in the lodge hall_. Only, the friend held a wand in her hand, raised like a knife, and she was clearly furious.

“You think you can lie, Vophyd?  You think you can tell this man Voldemort’s day is coming. _Voldemort is dead!_ Harry Potter _killed_ him at the battle of Hogwarts. I was there.  _Incarcerous!”_

And then. Good Lord. Good Lord. Before his eyes. Rope.  A rope came from out of nowhere and bound Vophyd from his chest to his knees; bound his arms to his torso.  

Then Jen also produced a wand from somewhere and raised it, but Laura’s friend turned to her.  

“Jen Star, I know all about you. You only spent two years at Durmstrang. You left when you were fourteen.  You do _not_ want to duel me.”  That was all she had to say; Jen backed off.  

Without turning entirely toward him, she introduced herself,  “Mayor Pevensie, I’m terribly sorry to barge in like this. I am Hermione Granger from the Department of Magical Law Enforcement at the British Ministry of Magic.”  

Then she turned her full attention back to Vophyd.  “Now Vophyd, what shall I do?  Shall I arrest you and take you back to the Ministry?  Shall I have you tried for kidnapping, and unlawful use of magic in front of Muggles, and extortion, and everything else I have on you?”

 Vophyd looked stunned.  Stupefied.  Hermione offered an alternative: “Or will I take Bibl back home to his family, and be satisfied to hear you swear that you and your band are going back to Denmark, and will never come to America or talk to any of these people ever again?” 

Hermione kept her wand raised.  Jen glared furiously at Vophyd, and Vophyd still didn’t answer.  But Jack could look at him, look at Hermione, and know clear as day who had won. Hermione looked as if she was about to speak when Vophyd said, “Yes, Miss Granger, please take Bibl safely home.  We are guests of Mayor Pevensie here, at his house up the road, and we have a Portkey waiting for us there.”

Hermione made an effort to sound gentler.  “Bibl, is there anything you want from the house?”  He shook his head no. “Can you go with Laura now?”  Laura turned to him and opened her arms just slightly, and Bibl ran to her.

Then Vophyd said, quite clearly, his composure completely restored: “Bibl, please don’t forget that we are your friends.  We never hurt you, and with us you could have gone to Durmstrang.”

After that point, the day improved considerably.

Vophyd and Jen went back to the guest house, and disappeared. Hermione assured Jack that they had gone back to Denmark by way of the Portkey, whatever it was.  Then she spent the afternoon describing to Bibl how he would be able to return home to his family and then go not to some school called Durmstrang but rather to one called Hogwarts.  Hermione had all sorts of embellished tales of Hogwarts, which amused both Laura and the boy quite thoroughly. 

Then the two of them, Hermione and Jack, took a long walk. They visited the Battle Scar and two of the portals. She told him that she did indeed work for the British Ministry of Magic, but that her threat to arrest Vophyd had been a bluff.  At the eastern portal, he revealed to her the words he had learned for renewing the charm.  It was clear that she was very knowledgable, but not familiar with that particular spell. She repeated it with fascination.  Jack could tell that she cast it well from the way it turned the quiet forest still quieter, an effect he remembered from his first trips up there many years ago.  After this, he had many questions for her. She did not answer all of them, but the answers she did give helped to put his mind at ease, and she assured him that Laura would be able to summon her whenever her presence was needed.

That evening, she put on a set of long robes, and then did the very thing he had always suspected he might see.  She stood before the fireplace in the lodge and threw in a handful of powder.  Green flames leapt up, and she stepped into them with Bibl and disappeared.  Jack could not have had a greater thrill than finally to have seen this with his own eyes.  Laura, on the other hand, was rather torn up about it.  If he had to wager on it, he’d say Laura was quite fond of the girl.

 

**Author's Note:**

> This story would not exist at all without the inspiration of Hedge_witch and Vana, and it wouldn't be any good but for Vana performing a range of magical Editor spells, from "nudge the writer to keep writing" to "point out the unfortunate wording" to "fix all the typos."


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